Hello, I am a sophmore in highschool and I really want to go to Cal Poly SLO for psychology which i know is under their Liberal Arts college. I am working really hard and finals are coming up, currently I have all A’s and B+ in my classes and am leader of a leadership club NOTE: (my school doesn’t recognize a+'s but my highest grade is a 98%) I am pretty sure that that equates to a 3.6 or 3.5 GPA. Does anyone have any tips on how to improve besides “get better grades” and set myself on a great track to get into Cal Poly! I would really love to go to this school! Thank you so much
Welcome to College Confidential @Camicot and you are smart to be thinking ahead.
First of all, it is nice to have a top choice school but you definitely do not want to “put all your eggs in one basket”, so you should be looking at a variety of schools for your major.
Cal Poly SLO is different from the rest of the Cal states in terms of how they review the CSU application.
SLO uses MCA points (explanation below) instead of an eligibility index to rank applicants by major. Also the acceptance rate for each major can vary from 5% to 99%. For Psychology, you are looking at an expected acceptance rate of around 8% so a tough admit. For this year, they expected 2576 Freshman applicants and targeted 210 Freshman admits.
SLO calculates their CP GPA using grades from 9-11th for the a-g courses and caps the Honors points at 8 semesters of UC approved Honors/AP/IB or DE courses taken 10-11th grades. You can use the RogerHub calculator to determine your CP GPA but include 9-11th grades with the honors points cap.
They will also require you to include any Math such as Algebra/Geometry and Foreign Language taken in Middle school since they give rigor points for exceeding the CSU minimum course requirements.
https://rogerhub.com/gpa-calculator-uc/
So based on last year’s Freshman profile and the low acceptance rate you want a target CP GPA of at least a 4.0+ and an ACT of 30+, SAT of 1350+ but there is no guarantee since you will be evaluated against all Psych applicants.
Below is how to calculate your MCA score. SLO does consider your EC’s and if you have leadership and/or you have a major related job, that gives you extra MCA points but this area is minimal in comparison to GPA and test scores.
Academic MCA:
The maximum GPA they will use is 4.2, even though you can have a higher calculated CP GPA. A 4.2 is worth 2250 MCA points. Thus, multiply your CP GPA by 535.7 and you’ll get your MCA points for GPA.
The next biggest thing is test scores. The odd thing, likely because they wanted it to total a nice round number, is that the max score is 1650, even though the max SAT score is 1600. Multiply the total of your best SAT CR and your best SAT math by 1.03125 to get your MCA test points. If you took the ACT, they convert and vice versa.
The third largest section is the class rigor score, worth 750 points. In this section you get zero points for meeting the minimum admission requirements and adders for more than the minimum. The bonuses in order of power are (min semesters/max total semesters/bonus per extra semester/total possible bonus): math 6/10/125/500, lab science 4/8/50/200, English 8/10/50/100, foreign language 4/8/25/100, visual performance 2/4/25/50, no bonus points for social sciences or electives. As with GPA, you can actually score higher than the maximum, but 750 is the most they will count.
Finally, work and ECs, worth 350 points. Work (hours per week/bonus): 0/0, 1-5/20, 6-10/40, 11-15/60, 16-20/80, 21+/100, add 50 points if work is major related. ECs (hours per week/bonus): 0/0, 1-5/30, 6-10/60, 11-15/90, 16-20/120, 21+/150, add 60 points for leadership role.
There are also other Non-Academic Bonus Points:
CA vet/701, Hayden Partner School/700, faculty/staff dependent/700, service area of CP/500, either parent with some or no HS, but who DIDN’T GRADUATE FROM HS/300 (per parent).
Lastly,
Cal Poly ACT/SAT Concordance Chart in case you took ACT (use only Math and English and figure out the two equivalent SAT scores)
ACT CR M
36 800 800
35 770 790
34 760 780
33 750 760
32 720 730
31 700 700
30 680 680
29 650 660
28 630 640
27 610 620
26 590 600
25 570 580
24 550 560
23 540 540
22 520 520
21 500 500
20 490 480
19 470 460
18 450 440
17 440 410
16 420 390
15 400 360
14 380 330
13 360 300
12 330 280
11 300 260
Here’s how it works. Cal Poly does TWO “READINGS” one of academic only and one after adding additional non-academic bonus adders. The reason I put readings in quotes is that they don’t actually READ them. A computer tallies points and then ranks students.
Thank you! So what would you say if I got my GPA up to 3.75 - 3.8 but got a good SAT score what are my chances then? like X/100
No way to chance on hypothetical GPA and scores. Just do your best, apply widely and hope for the best. You will be compared to all Psych applicants so there is no way to gauge your chances other than your chances will be at least 8%. Where you go for Undergrad will not define you, it is what you do with opportunities you are given that will make you successful.
You can check your MCA score against other applicants from 2018 here:
As captured above by @gumbymom the MCA is way more involved than just GPA and SAT.
As you can see here,
https://admissions.calpoly.edu/prospective/profile.html
the average GPA for Lib Arts was 3.95 and SAT 1343. That means you will have to make up the difference in other areas like class rigor (math in particular), ECs etc. I am sure it is mathematically possible but, keep an open mind about other schools because, i think it will be a stretch.
SDSU, CSULB, Sonoma and Chico all have very good psych programs.
What is interesting about this is that, at CPSLO, a GPA point is equivalent to 519 SAT points, based on the above multipliers. Compare that to other CSUs, where the eligibility index formula values a GPA point as equivalent to 800 SAT points. UCs do not use a point system, but appear to generally weight GPA heavily relative to SAT in holistic readings. This means that CPSLO weights SAT higher and GPA lower than other CSUs and probably UCs.
I suggest you look at the admitted threads at SLO for your major over past few years. It is a very popular major and the bar is high 4.0 ish (just too many applicants). If psych is your choice apply to many schools.